I Think I Joined the Busted Seat Spring Club Today

I Joined the Busted Seat Spring Club Today

On the way home from work today, driving along and BAM! Sounded and felt like something huge slammed into the undercarriage of the Jetta, but I was puttering along in traffic at about 10 MPH. My wife was with me and she jumped and screamed, "What the hell was that!" I just went, "Ahh it finally happened", and grinned at her. She thought I was nuts. Good thing I read the posts here about the seat spring breaking with a deafining bang! Otherwise I would have searched like crazy for undercarriage damage.

Oddly, both seat lifts still work fine and I did not find a big spring rolling around under the seat.

Update: Yes, I found it. Passenger's side. I showed it to my wife and told her this is what she heard and felt busting loose under her seat and she said, "God, I have to get back on my diet!"

--Nate

I noticed one laying under my passenger seat the other day... never heard it, but knew exactly what it was.

Mine was laying on the front floor mat the day after I bought the car used.

Not sure if it came of then or it was hard braking. It doesn't appear broke but my buddy looked and it appears it would require seat removal to replace.

Where is the main thread talking about this?

Haven't seen a 'main thread', just lots and lots of 'where did this spring come from?' threads

jeez you boys and gals really need to eat less junk food

Not even funny, hid3.

The mass pushing down on the seat cushion has nothing to do with this. It is merely yet another crappy german engineering decision. The little cast hook that the spring is on is cast, it is brittle, and it can't hold the spring tension. For any of these, it is merely a matter of time before you find the spring.

If you look carefully enough, you will also find a small chunk of metal that looks broken on one end. It is only about 4mm in diameter, and 6-7mm long. The chunk is probably hiding under the seat also, and since very few people are silly enough to remove a seat to look for it, very few people have seen it. Or maybe they all just heard the click as a vacuum sucked it up.

I made the mistake of asking the dealer for a replacement seat frame (it was still under warranty at the time) The replacement parts - the seatback does not sit tight against the seat, so if you put something on the seat, like a map, it falls through.

Best fix? Do nothing. Thats what I did with the drivers seat and it goes up and down just fine

Thats what happened to me... I found my spring yesterday..

So where does the spring attach? What did it do, and should I try to replace it??